


Inanna

by Sadbhyl



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-08
Updated: 2011-03-08
Packaged: 2017-10-16 19:36:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/168628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadbhyl/pseuds/Sadbhyl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sarah has descended into the underworld.  When she returns, she’ll never be the same.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Inanna

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to see this as a prequel to [Stress Reaction](http://sadbhyl.livejournal.com/551705.html), I won’t mind, but it’s not necessary to have read that to understand this.

John was still breathing.

Despite the quiet echoes of water and murmured Chinese against ancient brickwork, Sarah could just make out his soft exhales, not labored or erratic. Still unconscious. She had held his head in her lap after being forced at gunpoint into the tinted windowed sedan that waited at the curb, saw the actual takeaway delivery arrive as they were pulling away. They’d been alone in the backseat, but it hadn’t mattered. The doors had the child locks engaged, and even if she had been able to get them open, she wasn’t about to leave John behind, injured and vulnerable. Instead she had found a tissue in her pocket and pressed it to the wound on his head, ignoring the eyes watching her in the rearview.

Sherlock was at the museum. It would be hours before he even knew they were missing.

 _Don’t panic, Dr. Sawyer. Observe and assess._

She breathed slowly through her nose, the gag in her mouth already soggy with saliva. The knots resisted her attempts to escape, tugging at them with her fingertips before pulling at them in a vain hope of loosening the bonds enough to slip her thin hand through. Her inner critic pointed out that even if she could get her hands free, she wouldn’t have enough time to free her feet before they noticed.

It was already too late for that anyway. Insect-like sunglasses turned in her direction, the round, feminine features they left exposed stern and hard. “I regret the accommodations, lady,” she said, her thickly accented English showing an imperfect mastery of idiom, “but we had to be certain Mr. Holmes was properly motivated to assist us.”

Hope flared. Were they actually trying to lure Sherlock here? If he knew where they were…

The woman caressed a leather-gloved finger along Sarah’s jaw. “Perhaps now you wish you had chosen his tall, handsome associate instead.”

Oh, God. She thought John was Sherlock.

He groaned softly, head wobbling. The woman stepped back and waited.

 _Keep it together, Sarah, don’t lose it, oh God._

The moment they uncovered the crossbow, all reasonable thought irised down to abject fear.

She had seen what it could do, held the shaft itself in her hands, used it as a weapon herself. And now she was going to feel it again, much more intimately.

 _Keep it—_ Her breath caught in a sob.

All that existed in the whole world was her and the crossbow, blinding her to everything going on around her. Long, cool fingers plucking at her wrists didn’t register, nor when those fingers were ripped away. It was just her and the bow and the sandbag ticking down the remaining seconds of her life.

She took her last breath…

The bow hissed and snapped, the sound reaching her the same moment the bolt buried itself in the acrobat.

Between one breath and the next, reality came back to her. John lay on the floor, smiling sheepishly up at her. Hands stroked comfortingly down her arms, back to her tied wrists, and Sherlock’s resonant bass assured her, “You’re going to be all right. It’s over now.”

When he came around to free her feet, she wanted to bury her fingers in his hair and bend down to inhale the scent of it, throw herself into John’s embrace and lose herself in his strength.

She was born again.


End file.
